


Anniversaries

by TheWonderConner



Category: Persona 5
Genre: Anxiety, Complicated Grieving, Friendship, Gen, OOC Yusuke probably, Platonic Relationship, mentions of maternal death, this thing got away from me fast
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-31
Updated: 2019-01-31
Packaged: 2019-10-19 18:45:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,807
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17606882
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheWonderConner/pseuds/TheWonderConner
Summary: Futaba is having a bad day and turns to Yusuke to help. Unexpectedly, he has some fairly decent advice.





	Anniversaries

              Futaba shifted uncomfortably in her computer chair, clicking idly through the mass of homework she was supposed to be in the process of completing. Her phone was screen down on the far side of the bed, but her eyes kept drifting to the date displayed in the corner of the monitor. She snarled and snagged a sticky note and plastered it over the offending pixels—still careful to not get any of the glue on the actual screen. The plastic of the frame would clean off better, she decided. Even if she didn’t want to clean it at all, the sticky note was still better than the reminder of the date staring her in the face.

              “Out of sight out of _miiiind_ ,” Futaba chanted to herself, trying to focus back on her schoolwork. She scrolled down the list, back up, then clicked on a line at random. A mass of text appeared and Futaba frowned. That hadn’t been what she wanted. Sighing, she let herself fall back into the chair, her shoulders colliding with the blanket thrown across it with a gentle thump. She tilted her head so she stared up at the ceiling. “I wish Ren were here.” Even though his summer break lasted another week, he’d had to depart from Tokyo early to attend a cram school his parents were insisting on. Ren wouldn’t entirely understand, she knew, but he’d listen and it’d be better than sitting here pretending to focus on a project. Not that this was something she wanted to discuss via text. . . .

              She was up and across the room before she knew what she was doing. _Of course._ How could she have been so dumb? She _did_ have someone that would know almost _exactly_ what she was dealing with! Even if he wasn’t the first person she’d think to contact. She snagged her phone from atop the bedspread and jammed in her security code. Scrolling through her contacts, she thumbed “Inari” and jotted out a quick text.

              _“You have a minute? There’s something I wanted to ask you.”_

_“Certainly. How may I be of service?”_

Futaba paused. Usually she was the first to find comfort in the realm of backlit, glowing screens and straightforward print on contrasting backgrounds. And yet. _“I don’t really wanna talk about it over the phone. Can we meet?”_

_“Would you mind coming to Shibuya? I came to people watch and am afraid I only have enough train fare for the ride home.”_

“Some things just don’t change,” Futaba murmured to herself, launching up from her bed and grabbing her wallet and keys. _“You gotta let me hack that pass of yours one of these days. I’ll be there in 30.”_

_“Excellent. I’ll see you then.”_

In retrospect, Futaba should have suspected her ability to deal with crowds today would be compromised. She’d been making so much progress, she hadn’t even thought about it. She’d thought about it the moment she stepped out of the subway station into the throng of people making their way down the streets. A half a block later, she’d been so overwhelmed by the sights, sounds—heck, even the _smells_ seemed to be driving her up the wall—that she backed into a relatively quieter side alley and quickly texted Yusuke. Her fingers fumbled over the on-screen buttons until she was able to send a somewhat-reliable indicator of her location.

              _I was doing so well!_ Futaba thought to herself, gritting her teeth as she tried to remember the breathing Ren had taught her for a panic attack. She hadn’t ever considered the breathing itself particularly helpful, but trying to remember it and walking through it in her head kept her mind from spiraling down into more anxiety-inducing thought patterns. _I was doing so—no, no. Inhale and count . . . 2 . . . 3_

“Futaba?” She jerked her head around to see Yusuke standing at the entrance to her little hideaway, head tilted in something that may have been confusion or concern. It was hard to tell with him.

              “Yusuke!” Futaba jumped to her feet and made her way to him, clutching at his sleeve and moving in so their sides almost touched. Normally she’d be mortified to even consider such a thing, but with her current predicament, she found she could make an exception. “Uh. Thanks . . . thanks for coming.”

              “Of course,” Yusuke said. He looked over at her curiously and lifted the arm she clung to experimentally. Her grip tightened. One deep blue eyebrow arched elegantly, but Yusuke simply shrugged. “What is it you wished to discuss?” Futaba focused again on her breathing, letting the presence of someone she trusted calm her. “Futaba? Are you well?”

              “Kinda?” Futaba offered after another moment. “Not really. I was low on HP already, I should have known that this quest would be too much.”

              “I . . . see.” Yusuke looked around. “I find the passerby quite invigorating myself. But perhaps we should head somewhere less crowded?”

              “I’d appreciate that,” Futaba mumbled. Yusuke led her gently though the crowds, chattering on about different artistic techniques that the various advertisements around them used. Futaba figured that it was Yusuke’s usual passion and cluelessness that drove the one-sided conversation, but in that moment she could almost believe that he knew the sound of a familiar voice grounded her.

              “Here we are,” Yusuke said. “There are still a few people around, but at least it’s not one of the main streets.” Futaba looked up and side the small side street they were on. A small stream flowed sluggishly past them, sending up a faint whiff of moss and wet dirt. There were indeed a handful of people milling about, but their presence was a dull murmur as opposed to the roar of mainstreet Shibuya. Yusuke regarded her silently.

              “It’s much better,” Futaba said with a sigh. “Thank you.” She detached herself from his arm and hopped up onto one of the guardrails separating the street from the waterfront. She sat atop it, hands clutching the green bar on either side of her hips, legs bent and feet hooked through one of the lower rails. Yusuke joined her after a moment, leaning on it so he could look out over the stream. “Hey, Inari?”

              “Hmm?”

              “I don’t know if we ever told you, but my mom—” Futaba’s throat began to close. She coughed and forced herself forward. She’d called Yusuke all the way out here, and he’d been kind enough to deal with one of her panic attacks. “My mom died three years ago today.”

              “I’m sorry, Futaba,” Yusuke said.

              “What I wanted to ask was . . . well. You know what it’s like.” She glanced over at him, searching for any indication he’d taken offense to the statement. His expression remained unreadable as he stared at the water. “So. What do you do for the anniversaries? How do you handle them? I thought I was okay, but—” She sighed and freed a foot to kick at the railing a bit. “Got any tips?”

              “I . . . don’t know, Futaba,” Yusuke said. “I’ve never . . . known the date of my mother’s passing.” He linked his hands in front of him, leaning on his elbows. “Madarame never put much emphasis on it, and as I was too young at the time to understand what had happened, I never questioned it.” He seemed to take several moments studying his long fingers. “The few times I did ask, I was told she wouldn’t want me to worry about such things, and to focus on my art.”

              “Inari. . . . ”

              “I suppose there are ways for me to find out,” Yusuke said. “I still have the material inheritance that Madarame left to me, and I would assume that contains some sort of report about her death, perhaps even a memorial of sorts, but. . . . ”

              “No, I get it,” Futaba said. “That . . . that can’t be an easy thing to do. Especially since you’ve lived so long without knowing.” She sighed.

              “Indeed,” Yusuke said. He stared out at the water a moment longer, then looked to her. “Perhaps your answer lies closer than you think. What have you done on anniversaries previous?”

              Futaba grimaced without meaning to. “I haven’t done anything. Yet. The first year after her death I was still with family and there were—well—y’know.” She shrugged.

              “Your uncle,” Yusuke said, eyes narrowing. She’d finally broken down during Ren’s summer visit and let the entirety of the group in on at least the basics of what had occurred with her mother’s family after her passing. She thought it was a testament to what little tact Yusuke had picked up recently that he chose not to comment further.

              “Yeah,” Futaba said. “And last year was all that with Medjed and the PT. By the time it was all over and I really realized what day it was, it was pretty much done. Also I was quite literally in the middle of a change of heart, so there were a lot of other things to think about.”

              “Quite,” Yusuke said.

              “Yeah,” Futaba said. “So this is the first year that I've really had the mental bandwidth to think about it, and it's messing me up. I thought that maybe—I don’t know.” She didn’t want to make Yusuke feel bad, not after she’d brought up a sensitive subject. “I guess I didn’t think it all the way through.”

              “What do you want to do?” Yusuke asked. “That may be a good place to start.”

              “I—I don’t know,” Futaba said. “Forget about it. Forget it’s happening, I mean.” She sighed. “Try to remember everything I can. The good, the bad, everything. Both. At once. All at the same time. See everyone and everything. See nobody. I don’t know. It’s all contradictory and messed up in my head.” She took a deep, shaky breath. “It’s so confusing.”

              “I see. Is there a memorial we could go visit, perhaps? I’ve painted scenes of people visiting their loved ones’ graves on days like this.” Yusuke shrugged. "I'm lead to believe that's a common activity on an anniversary."

              “We?” Futaba asked. “You’d come with me?” Yusuke nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, we can do that.”

              “And if you don’t like it, we’ll do something else,” Yusuke said. Futaba stared at him. “It’s sensible, after all. If you do one thing and it doesn’t work, you move onto the next. It’s just like art.” He frowned. “Although perhaps a bit more linear. Or less so, given the nature of the human heart.”

              Futaba found herself laughing. “All right, all right.” She jumped from the rail and grabbed Yusuke’s arm again. “Come on, you suddenly introspective weirdo. Let’s go. We’ll find something worthwhile to do before the day ends.” She paused as Yusuke let himself be lead along, still pensive. “Thanks for . . . coming along. And everything.”

              “It's no trouble, Futaba.” He smiled. “That’s what friends are for.”

**Author's Note:**

> For my mother  
> June 15, 1955-January 30, 2018


End file.
